*I would just like to clarify that in Korea, their first semester begins in Spring, in March (until July) then the second semester runs from late August to February. The story takes place in the second semester.

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Date:  September 18                   

It's a long weekend because chuseok* is this weekend. Everyone's households are pretty busy, with people traveling back to hometowns and families in preparations for feasts. My mom thinks I'm just a bother and in the way, so she always kicks me out of the house the day before chuseok while she prepares food with my older sister. She simply warns me to be home on time for dinner. My dad left the house on his own, to I don't know where. My parents fight quite a bit these days, so it was probably for the best. My mom and sister were up early hours of the morning, while I slept in until 11 and took my time getting dressed and washing up. I sat in the kitchen with a piece of toast in my mouth, watching them cut up vegetables and taste testing spices and flavours. When I thought they weren't looking, I swiped bits of food from them. It wasn't long before my mom practically picked me up by my arm and shoved me out the door. But it wasn't a big problem. Our group had decided to meet up that day and hang out in Dongdaemun since we figured we'd all probably be kicked out of our respective homes.

The door was just shut behind me when I received a message in our KakaoTalk group chat from Joonmyun. He couldn't make it because his family was spending the day in Hannam-dong** (where his grandparents live) before traveling to Gwangju. Upon that message, Jongin began making jokes about how rich Joonmyun was. That was another running joke among us; Joonmyun 's family wealth (although it is true). We often called him "Prince Joonmyun", made comments about how he never wore the same clothes twice, and stuff like him sleeping in a bed made of unicorn hair. Kyungsoo then chimed in; he wasn't joining us either since he was helping his mom cook. That was not too surprising, since he cooked well and was quite a mama's boy. So that left Baekhyun, Sehun, Jongin, and I.

We didn't even know what we were going to do in Dongdaemun. It was just that we spent far too much time in Myeongdong and wanted a change in scenery. So Jongin suggested Dongdaemun. It was around 1pm when we met up, so we decided to go for lunch. Baekhyun suggested a place he knew known for their naengmyun (cold noodles), and his recommendation was a good one; it was some pretty good grub, I have to admit. We ate and chatted, with random interruptions from the two idiots as they fooled around with the noodles and pretended to have beards. I made a comment about their immaturity, to which Sehun retorted with an expressionless face "Sorry, for making fun of your arms and legs." Thanks Sehun. Nice of you to remind me about my awkward and clumsy movements. Speaking of awkward and clumsy, I proceeded to knock over a bowl (thankfully made of plastic, and thankfully empty!) and sweep a napkin to the floor as I attempted to swat Sehun's head. Stupid Jongin blocked me off. Those two. I swear. They cackled as I leaned over to pick up the bowl, and Baekhyun nabbed the napkin. He handed it to me with a smile. That smile. It's really getting to me. It's contagious or something. I couldn't help but smile back. The thing with Baekhyun is that you can always tell if the smile is genuine. When he smiles, or laughs, his whole face lights up and his eyes become half moons. To this point in time, I haven't yet seen a smile that doesn't reach his eyes. But heck, I've only known him for 3 weeks. I often wondered if people can tell when my smiles aren't genuine. I found myself having to fake one more and more often nowadays. Funny enough, Baekhyun brought it up not long after.

After lunch, Sehun started to grumble and complain about not knowing what to do. About being bored. He left the restaurant with Jongin as I paid for my meal at the front counter. Baekhyun followed, and we left together...only to see no Sehun or Jongin. Typical them. Disappearing without notice. I called Jongin only to have it go to voicemail. Baekhyun called Sehun. Also voicemail. I was pretty annoyed at that point. I began spamming their inboxes with messages until finally Jongin replied. But his response just pissed me off even more:

We're at a PC bang down the street playing WoW. Come so we can destroy you ㅋㅋㅋ~ ***

Seriously? These asses. If I wanted to play WoW I would've just stayed home with my laptop, not come out to Dongdaemun. I shouldn't have even been surprised those two were off playing WoW...but it still annoyed me. I cursed under my breath. Thankfully at that point, Baekhyun helped me calm down. He threw in a few jokes, gave another dazzling smile, and dragged me down the street in the opposite direction of the PC bang. I guess I should thank Sehun and Jongin for ditching us, because I ended up having a lot of fun. The most I've had for a while.

Baekhyun dragged me to get ice cream at Baskin Robbins, which I'm a er for. We never stopped talking and joking around. It was comfortable with him. There was no pressure for anything, and I could truly be myself. I think the only other person I could be so relaxed with was Kyungsoo, and I had known him since I was a kid. I try to be a happy person, joke around and make people happy. In a way it's a bit of a mask. I have my own troubles and prefer not to expose them to the world to see. He casually mentioned that sometimes, I look creepy and a bit intimidating. I was tall, had a voice that didn't match my face, and pretty big eyes. But that was when my smile didn't reach the rest of my face. He noticed that my eyes turned sorta glassy and still despite the large grin plastered across my face. But that was it. The smile was fake; my lips with were turned up and my teeth showed, but it looked stiff to him. I was a bit surprised when he told me this. I wasn't sure what to say. He made it so easy though...he simply chucked and gave me a light shove in the shoulder and said "Hey, you're at least actually happy right now!"

On another note, I finally got to learn about Baekhyun's past at his old school, and wow. He is definitely a character. As I learned from videos he showed on his phone.

My initial reaction was literally to just stop and stare at the videos, eyes wide and unblinking. I looked up at him, back at the video, and back at him. I couldn't stop myself then. I burst out laughing like a crazed hyena. People stared at me like I was nuts while Baekhyun began to laugh as well. We laughed continuously for a while, not caring what other people thought as our ice creams progressively melted on our plates. I didn't feel as embarrassed about my ferret photos anymore. I had to wipe a tear before managing to wheeze out a "why? no...what was that?"

He just laughed and said, "I was bored. I do random stuff for s and giggles. It's just me being my usual idiotic self. Though, I'm a bit more subdued now."

He continued and explained that his friends and him were talking about going to clubs one bored night, and they all expressed their desire to go. Obviously at that point in time, there was no way they'd be able to get past a bouncer. So they went over to his house and he went nuts, just fooling around. With a camera phone, ipod speakers at maximum volume, and a hand on the light switch, they started dancing like idiots like they were in a club. They flickered the lights on and off, drank soda pretending it was alcohol, and even found flashlights to spin around like strobe lights. Baekhyun was a self-proclaimed dancing machine amongst his friends.

"You know those moves obviously attracted swarms of girls," he joked.

Yes. They acted like idiots. He looked like an deranged dysfunctional robot. His parents walked in on the chaos after a dinner out, slightly weirded out by their own son and friends. But they had a lot of fun that night. And that's why the video was still on his phone. It reminded him of some good times. I couldn't help but ask him if he has had any good times with us. He paused for a moment.

"Ya. It's been fun. Nothing mindblowing but...I'm glad I met you guys. And obviously, thank you for everything so far."

I wanted to give him a hug then (a manly one, obviously...because I'm manly...) but decided against it and just gave him a high five. We slurped up the remainder of our ice creams and exited the store.

"Let's make today memorable. Let's go do some crazy ," he suddenly said.

Why the heck not? We'd been ditched by everyone else. I had no idea what he had in mind as I followed him...and found ourselves at Gyeongbok Palace. He slid his phone out of his pocket, started up his music player with some Euro techno music, and held it out to me. "Video!" he had shouted. I still had no idea what he had in mind as I aimed the lens at him...until he began dancing like a crazy person in front of the main gates. He did the same moves as he did in his old videos, and I couldn't help but start shaking with laughter. There was no way the video was coming out steady. He grabbed hold of my arm and started shaking me around to get me moving as well. We were attracting attention from some tourists and I felt self-conscious. But seeing Baekhyun so carefree, I thought it, and began moving. He cackled as he snatched his phone back from me and held it up to capture a video of both of us, just behaving like two oddball animals in front of a historical monument. But it felt good. It felt good to not care and act spontaneous. Baekhyun suddenly shouted "RANDOM ACT OF KINDNESS!", and pulled out a lollipop from his jeans pocket. He ran over to a family of three foreigners. I stopped and pulled out my phone then, wondering what he had in mind. The two parents looked a bit surprised as Baekhyun kneeled in front of their little girl and grinned.

"Lollipop. For you," he beamed, holding it out to the girl.

The little girl broke out in a huge smile and accepted the lollipop with a giggle. I watched as her parents thanked him with "kamsahamnida", the phrase laced with strong English accents. The dad kneeled down and gently patted his little girl's hair. Baekhyun gave a little bow in response and fished out more lollipops from his pockets. He proceeded to jog over to different groups of people that had been standing around watching us, handing out lollipops. As the small crowd dispersed upon the distribution of the last lollipop, he ran back over to me, the grin still on his face.

"I'm putting this on youtube. Nutso kid does insane dance and hands out lollipops. Or something like that."

"It feels good. And you're going to need a better title than that if you want people to watch it" he stated, stretching his two arms into the air, eyes clothes and taking a deep breath.

"You're sort of really awesome," I responded, smiling broadly at him.

He laughed then and pulled me close to put an arm around me before looking at me straight in the eye.

"You too."

*Chuseok is Midautumn's Festival, which follows the lunar calendar, and is a major Korean holiday. The Chinese also have Midautumn's Festival and is similar in some ways but celebrated differently.

**Hannam-dong is a well-off neighbourhood home to many officials, foreign ambassadors, and business execs. A lot of non-Koreans inhabit the area and real estate there is pretty expensive.

***PC bang = PC방 = literally, PC room, aka internet cafe. WoW = World of Warcraft. ㅋㅋㅋ = kekeke.

A/N: Not edited...again. I'm slowly progressing this story, building up their feelings and emotions, and giving more glimpses of Chanyeol's inner self...I lost some subscribers probably because I'm moving slowly? XD

If you want to see Baekhyun in some of his insanity (I died laughing) just go to THIS youtube video of him play fighting with his friends and THIS video of him crazy dancing. SEE I WASN'T LYING ABOUT HIM PRETENDING TO BE IN A CLUB LOL. There are more videos floating around as well that I won't link to.

edit: not a new chapter but wanted to let you guys know I started a new story called Baku. It features Sehun and an OC. It's on the angsty side, but feel free to check it out anyway!